Hermione Granger and the Pure-Blooded Bastard
by Cybrokat
Summary: Hermione is working on a project for the Ministry when she finds a long buried secret.
1. Chapter 1

**Author/Artist: **Cybrokat  
**Recipient:**BookofMoonRevel  
**Title:** Hermione Granger and the Pure-Blooded Bastard  
**Rating:** T – Cussing and Mild Adult Situations  
**Warnings:** None  
**Genre:** Rom/Com with a touch of Angst  
**Summary:** Hermione is working on a project for the Ministry when she finds a long buried secret.  
**Author's Notes:** Love to my alpha, beta and Brit-picker and to MoonRevel for such a fun prompt! This story is, of course, as always, complete! I'll be posting a chapter every few days. I actually have THREE stories I need to get posted, so here we go!  
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**Chapter One**

She would never forget the taste of his blood in her mouth. It covered her hands, her clothes, her face. Laboriously working over him, her hand absently swiped a piece of hair from her mouth, leaving the tang of copper and a level of intimacy Hermione Granger had never thought she would experience with her professor.

"Hermione!" she heard from a voice behind her. "We have to go!"

"He isn't breathing, Harry! I can't…I can't just leave him! Professor Snape is going to die!" And it wasn't his fault, her mind told her. None of this was his fault. She had been so blind. So blind. Not his fault. None of it. And here he was, going to die on the floor of this dusty and forgotten shack. Forgotten.

Her purse.

"Hermione, _now_."

Quick as lightening, she _Accio_ed the vial, popped the stopper, and shoved all three bezoars and a bottle of Blood Replenishing potion down Professor Snape's throat. She couldn't remember offhand if there could be damage by consuming too many bezoars, but without them, he was as good as dead anyway.

She left the shack, never turning back.

~~~HGSS~~~

Hermione sat up with a gasp at the sound of her alarm wand. Swishing it off, she rubbed the sleep from her eyes and tried to calm her heart. She hated that dream. That memory. The guilt had been with her every day since the defeat of Voldemort, a day so many others celebrated. And he hadn't even died.

No, Professor Snape was alive and as well as he ever was. But that wasn't what bothered her.

She had forgotten him, just like everyone else had.

Hermione never checked back on him after the victory. Between consoling the friends and family of the fallen and then toasting the triumphant Order of the Phoenix, she had never gone back to find out what happened to Severus Snape.

And it seemed he was never going to let her forget that she had forgotten.

Tying back her hair, she slid into the Great Hall before the majority of the castle inhabitants were even awake. Few eyes watched her progress, but his were always there. No matter what time she got up, he was always up before her, sitting immaculate in the chair next to hers, sipping his morning tea with a glare or a smirk on his face. A glare on the mornings she came in perky. A smirk on the days she was dragged in by Crookshanks.

Days like today.

"Good morning, Professor," she greeted him, sliding into her seat.

"Granger."

Hermione rolled her eyes. It had taken him a full three months of being colleagues to drop the "Miss." With a sigh, she pushed a few eggs around her plate and shot a glance at the man next to her. His presence wasn't helping her dismiss her dream, so she brought her eyes back to the center and thought about the day's work ahead of her. Classes, grading, research.

Snape watched her out of the corner of his carefully concealed eye. She was a strange one, Granger. Clearly not a morning person, he observed, as she poured another cup of tea. Lost in her own world, he was free to watch as her delicate hand brought the cup to her lips. As it was returned to its place, he looked away.

With a frown, Hermione looked over at him. He was awfully quiet this morning.

Snape, noticing her frown, took that as his cue to leave. No one should have to suffer his presence for long. Least of all her.

His mind flickered back. His blood spilled like his memories that night, and both made his recollection sparse. Her tears, hot on his face. Her voice, screaming and then murmuring.

"Why?" she had yelled. "…the whole time? Not possible…Dumbledore would have…Not right…"

And then she had left.

Snape's piercing gaze watched her leaving the Hall, messy chignon bouncing behind her after she had given up on breakfast. She could make small talk with him and tolerate her seat next to his, but he knew she had never forgotten his betrayal. She could never forget. Just one more regret he could add to the sea overflowing with them.

Hermione's step faltered just outside the door. Should she invite him to join her work? Two heads were better than one, and all that? No. He could barely manage two words to her. She was better off persevering alone.

~~HGSS~~

"DRAT!" echoed down the stone corridor, following "Sugar dates!" "Fudge!" and "Cheese and RICE!"

Snape heard the one-sided exchange from around two corners in his new office, slightly above the dungeons. Setting down his paper knife, he slid out of the door and leaned against the doorframe for the personal lab of one Hermione Granger, non-curser extraordinaire. She never used a foul word, but she certainly had a temper when things were not going her way. And whatever she was working on—he had no idea—was definitely not going her way.

A fuzzy brown halo bobbed to and fro amongst the vials, strange machines, and shimmering chalkboards. A few boards simply hovered in midair above her head, calculations written in her magical hand, one particularly long one scribbled out in red. Snape recognized a Muggle microscope and a rack of vials. After that, he was admittedly lost. Three tables were covered in her lab, and she was dancing in between them all.

Without turning around, she growled, "I don't want to hear it, Snape!"

"I've been listening to it all afternoon, I don't blame you."

Another growl was heard as she dumped a tray of…something into a rubbish bin.

"What are you working on?"

Hermione huffed a piece of hair out of her face as she turned to him. "Muggle science and silly wand waving. You wouldn't be interested."

"Don't I seem interested?" he asked.

"Not really."

"Hmm, probably because I'm not."

A drawn out sigh. "Why are you here, Snape? My last experiment was a complete failure. I can only modify a Shrinking spell so much, and it simply does not work on a cellular level, so I have no way of getting these stupid liposomes the correct size to pass through the pores in the nuclear membrane. I mean, what is magic good for anyway if you can't properly blend it with science? I don't care if I can turn my office walls pink until I can figure out _how_ I am turning them pink! I just need some bloody penetration!"

Severus knew when he was out of his intellectual (and personal) comfort zone and felt no loss of pride admitting to himself he had no fucking clue what she was blabbering about. This was the most she had said to him at once since the first day she came on staff and nervously tittered her way through their first meal. His well pointed glare alerted her that he hadn't changed and didn't really care about her studies abroad or the Muggle Science class she was teaching.

But now a dam had opened in her frustration. Working alone obviously did not suit her long term, accustomed as she was to having the other halves of the Golden Trio or a partner in her University classes. Any port in a storm, as they say, and a storm was brewing indeed. "Forgive me if I have intruded. Next time I hear your caterwauling, I will simply assume the resident know-it-all doesn't actually and go back to my grading."

With a brief and graceful bow, he left the room. Hermione's tension came out in a whoosh as her guilt came flooding back, and she couldn't help but feel there was something she had missed.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: **Thank you for the warm welcome back into posting. :) I appreciate all of you who reviewed and those who are following - thank you. Now you review too! :) I know is is much quicker than I normally post, reviews let me know if I'm being to swift. Hope you all enjoy.

**Chapter Two**

Hermione lounged on Harry's newly cleared off sofa. She secretly wondered if he only invited her to his rooms because he knew she'd clean. Hers were the better of the two, so there had to be a reason. She Banished a lost sock from underneath his chair as he put down the tea service.

Both of them were staff at the venerable Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Hermione was in her third year of teaching, having taken two years of Muggle science classes at Uni in order to prepare her to fulfill the offer McGonagall had given her. She was teaching Muggle sciences for the magical world. Just because a person had magic didn't make other disciplines obsolete as had been previously taught.

Learning was as important as breathing to someone like her. She longed to kindle that flame in others and took to teaching like an otter to water. Being raised in a non-magical household made her perfectly situated to implement the Ministry's plan to pacify the public—one that had been long pushed by the late Albus Dumbledore, a fact glossed over in the _Prophet_. But setting aside the propaganda, she was all too pleased to be offered a position back at the place she loved most, doing what she loved best, in an area that interested and suited her.

She and Harry were once again a team. It took him a bit longer to settle into the arena of teaching. His first thought had been to join the Aurors, but he found he couldn't support the Ministry after they had so bungled the return of Voldemort. But he still had a strong urge to fight against the forces that had controlled him for so long, and when, in an attempt to bring credibility back to the subject, the Muggle Studies position was offered to Harry, he had accepted without hesitation.

"Harry, I'm going to make this work if it's the last thing I do."

Her companion slowly poured his tea over his sugar cube as he contemplated her determination."But what if it can't be done?"

"Nothing can be done until someone does it. Twelve years ago, I would have told you magic was impossible and unicorns were the stuff of fairy tales. We already know is can be done, but bringing the magical world up to the times when it comes to science isn't going to be done overnight. It is going to happen. And I'm going to help do it. Did you know Draco's wife is pregnant?"

Harry's stirring ceased. "And she's a pure-blood, isn't she?"

Hermione nodded and crossed her legs on the sofa. "Daphne and Astoria's parents are both pure-blood. They have a few months before they can test, but…" She trailed off, watching the Keeper on the Quidditch poster on Harry's wall block the goal again and again. "With the rate we've seen in births lately, who knows what the chances are. Quite frankly, I'm horrified nothing has been seen before now. I know there are a few prevalent medical journals."

"But you know how Victorian they are, Hermione. If it's abnormal, it's just covered up. Why do you think it took Luna so long to finally find those Snotrags?"

"Snorkacks, Harry."

"Yeah. Those. Look, if you think there is a way to fix these babies before they are even born, then there is a way. Nothing has surpassed you yet."

"But there is always a first time," Hermione said sadly as she Banished the dishes back to the kitchens.

~~HGSS~~

Hermione toyed with her oatmeal, studiously ignoring the man beside her. Her spot at the table was horrid, she decided. Snape on one side and no one on the other since Hagrid rarely ate at the table. Flitwick was further down, but he was usually in conversation with the Headmistress and Sprout, leaving her and Snape to themselves. She contemplated sending Harry notes via enchanted paper but figured that would interfere with eating and encourage the students.

She sputtered as a scroll dropped into her bowl, before quickly retrieving it and cleaning it off. Clearly, this wasn't _her_ owl. Viktor was extremely pretentious when it came to his mistress's parcels and correspondence.

Viktor, the owl, was very much like Viktor, the Bulgarian Quidditch player with whom Hermione had had a brief intrigue in her fourth year. Though it was mostly innocent, she always kept in touch and had a soft spot for the quiet and brooding boy. When she bought an owl as a graduation gift to herself, she had seen the dark and handsome Eagle Owl, with its dark ear tufts resembling brows and its large bill and stocky build, and she had immediately thought of her foreign friend. Watching him waddle back and forth on his perch only to soar through the air across the shop sealed the deal. He was Viktor.

Unrolling the scroll and oblivious to the sudden interest in her lone breakfast companion, she read the unfamiliar scrawl.

Her eyes darted quickly back and forth, taking much longer than Severus knew it usually took her to read a document of that length. She was combing over it once, and then twice, trying to absorb all the information. The Ministry wanted her to work with them. Again. When had Hermione Granger ever been a proponent of the Ministry of Magic?

Somehow, and she wasn't sure how, they had found out about her little side research project. Hermione had been working to blend Muggle science and her magic. That wasn't a huge secret or surprise to anyone. But what she had specifically focused on was. In the past few years, it had been quietly coming to surface that there was a big problem with the post-Voldemort baby boom. Some babies weren't surviving.

With all the supposed magical advancements in medicine, doctors were still at a loss to solve why children were born with the heart defect. Hermione and a few others deduced that it was mostly pure-blood couple's babies born with a defect. Occasionally a pure-blood and a half-blood. No other babies had the defect. Hermione almost immediately jumped to genetics, but as far as she could tell, she was alone. Until now.

The MoM had contacted her in regards to her research, but they were asking her to add in a different angle. If it was true that only pure-bloods or half-bloods had the genetic defect, then they would need to be tested for the mutated gene.

But these days, who was actually pure? Or even half?

No one really knew.

Oh, there were illustrious family trees and papers, like pedigrees, handed down through the ages, but like all societies, they knew they had their secrets. Their skeletons in the closet. It was time for them to come out, and they were asking for her help.

Would she be willing to compile a master list of the blood status of the Wizarding world?

Hermione set the letter down with a sigh and rubbed her face. This could open up so much more than they were prepared to deal with. But ultimately, what choice did she have? If there were other defects or diseases in the future, it would be beneficial to know who was at risk. A stitch in time…

"Heart crushed, Granger?"

"I beg your pardon?" Hermione asked, suddenly remembering she was in the middle of the Great Hall, which was now full of bustling students and teachers.

Snape smirked at her depreciatively. "I assume from your crestfallen look that your heart has been shattered by a beau. A Weasley perhaps?"

"Oh, piss off, Snape. My problems are much larger than some imaginary romance."

"That they are indeed."

With a glare, she grabbed her letter and left for her lab, already focused back on the problem at hand, deciding how she was going to chart her findings.


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N:** If you enjoy, appreciate, smile, grimace, cringe or giggle, lease drop a coin in the box.

**Chapter Three**

Hermione sat at her desk, one hand grabbing her hair as she bowed her head. Bloody Ministry. Bloody pure-bloods and their family lines. Bloody genetics.

After a long, late-night chat with Crookshanks, she had decided to accept the offer from the Ministry. (Crooks still seemed skeptical, but in the end, he had agreed.) The offer came with a sizable sum of money, should she need it for anything. Plus, it was an opportunity to do what she did best as Hermione Granger, not a third of a trio. And she could have everything cataloged and color-coded and no one would say a word. Except probably Snape, of course.

Okay. Definitely Snape. He never passed up an opportunity to give the newest staff at Hogwarts a hard time. Or anyone for that matter.

But it didn't matter. She was going to be able to make a difference and hopefully create a tool that could be handed down and expanded upon through the ages. Maybe she could even start to take it back and figure out the source of magic. Was it a gene mutation? Hermione's brain wandered off into the land of trinucleotide repetitions and autosomal dominant genes.

When she found herself getting up to start scribbling on her chalkboard, she came back down to reality. She needed to focus. How was she supposed to make a graph of every wizard? Squibs too? Only in the UK, or in all of Europe? Hermione ended up back with her head bent at her desk.

"Dunderheads?"came a voice by the door.

"Of a sort," she mumbled. "Ministry dunderheads."

"The worst kind."

"Do you need something, Snape?" Hermione asked. She wasn't in the mood to deal with him. She didn't feel like having to defend herself or play in his battle of wits. Her mind was in overdrive, synapses firing in an attempt to bring the jumbled chaos to order. Only by sitting down and having a good think would she be able to make a plan of attack for her new project. And maybe a cup of tea. Tea was always beneficial.

"Not particularly."

Hermione looked up to where he leaned in her doorway. She swore even his lean was smirking. Did he always have to make fun of her? Even when he wasn't talking, she knew he was laughing at her on the inside. She must look pitiful, hair disheveled, clothes wrinkled and covered in chalk dust.

"I have a lot to figure out, Severus. If you don't mind?" Hermione made a motion toward the door and gave a bit of a frown when he gracefully slid from the frame and disappeared.

It wasn't until much later that she realized that that was the first time she had used his given name. To his face, anyway. One doesn't see someone practically die in their arms and still call them "Sir."

"Severus," she mused aloud, feeling like she was getting away with something. "Severus."

~~HGSS~~

Severus spent a long evening by the fire, book lying forgotten in his lap. Why did he keep finding his way to her office? It was clear she had no use for his company, neatly dismissing him before he had an opportunity to use the ruse he had concocted to explain himself.

And had she really used his name?

As he was lying underneath his covers, drifting off to sleep, his mind registered a soft, "Severus...Severus."

~~HGSS~~

Armed with parchment and a ballpoint pen—this was no time to mess with a quill—Hermione made a list of every wizard she knew. And thanks to her escapades with Harry, she knew quite a few. Armed with a few books on the larger wizarding families, she was able to compile a lengthy list. While making her list, she might as well get a start on samples as well, she figured.

St. Mungo's was a logical first choice. She used their records to add to her list and then got permission to collect a small blood sample from the patients and staff. Hermione quickly and efficiently drew a painless sample with her wand and bottled it in a small labeled vial.

This was not what she wanted to be doing on her free weekend. Focusing her thoughts on the broader picture, she picked up the hem of her robe and put a bounce in her step on her way back to the school. Staff would be next on the list, and then permission slips—Ministry sealed, of course—to collect from the students.

"Minerva," asked Hermione once she reached the office of the Headmistress, "would you be willing to gather the staff for me for a moment? I seem to have been chosen to head a project for the Ministry, and I'll need blood samples."

"Whatever for?" the woman asked, and Hermione explained the chart of blood purity and the defect being found in children.

"I doubt it's new, but you can't deny that pregnancies have skyrocketed in the post-Voldemort era. I think that makes what seemed before to be a random and rare occurrence a definite pattern. Not everyone agrees with me, of course, but the Ministry wants to stem a possible public backlash, and of course, they want an increasingly healthy population."

It was agreed upon to gather the teachers after dinner that evening for a quick sample. "But there's one problem," said Minerva. "Severus won't cooperate."

"He won't?" asked Hermione. "Of course he won't."

"Not out of his usual self, I assure you. Well, he has never been fond of medical treatments in the past. Regardless, I'm afraid that no one but Poppy has been able to treat him for anything. Especially after his, well, his injury during the battle. He'll hate me for telling you this, but he can hardly stand anyone touching him, especially withdrawing blood."

Hermione frowned, pondering a solution, when Minerva offered that she should check with Poppy. Perhaps she would have something.

After dinner, the staff gathered in the teacher's lounge where Hermione collected their samples. Black robes were seen briefly billowing past the door without even a hesitation.

With one empty vial, Hermione cornered the matron on her way back up to the hospital wing. "Madam Pomfrey," she asked, "would you happen to have a sample of Professor Snape's blood? Professor McGonagall didn't think he'd be very cooperative."

"And that he won't! I know I have a few samples set aside from during the war so that I could synthesize a Blood Replicator, as well as a Blood Replenishing Potion. Let's go see if they are viable."

Hermione followed Poppy up the stairs and waited patiently while the correct samples were found. After a bit of searching, they were located but unusable. "I'm so sorry, Hermione, the vials were in stasis too long. I'm afraid you'll need something fresh. Perhaps you should just go ask Severus yourself."

"Me?"

"And why not you? About time he loosens up a bit. Tell him I sent you, and if he doesn't comply, next time I see him, he won't get the gown that closes in the back."

Hermione giggled in spite of her nervousness at the thought of her Professor in a hospital gown. In her mind, the gown was all black, with opened buttons all up the back, leaving his white arse for the whole wing to see.

"I'll just stop down there then on my way to deliver these."

However, Hermione's confidence faded the closer she got to where she knew his personal rooms were. Before she stopped to second (and triple and quadruple) guess herself, she rapped on his door.

"Yes?" came a deep rumble from behind the door that caused her to sharply inhale.

"Professor? Um, Severus? It's Hermione."

"Obviously," came the answer as his door opened.

Hermione held up the little vial. "I just need a bit. Poppy sent me down."

"No."

"She said that if you don't, she won't give you the full gown next time."

He scowled as he turned away from the door, leaving it open. "Then it will be she recovering from blindness, not me."

"I know it's not something you care for, and I wouldn't ask if it weren't truly important. You could be saving lives."

"Guilt, Miss Granger?" The "Miss" was back, making Hermione frown. "I'm afraid guilt stopped working somewhere in your sixth year. All used up."

"I'm not trying to guilt you! I'm…I don't know what I'm doing. I have to get samples of everyone. I'm trying to figure out a way to save the children that are dying from a fatal heart defect after being born to magical parents. I know you've given enough. We all have, but it's truer for you. And I know this is something you hate and probably especially from me. The only person who irritates you more is Harry, I imagine, but I'll be quick, and it will be painless, and then I'll go. I promise." She paused her tirade to see if she was getting anywhere. They both stood, regarding each other in the silence. Both, in their own way, remembering that fateful night. The last time she had pleaded with him and acquired a sample of his blood. "You know I'm good at this. You know I'll be gentle. Please, Severus."

It was his name that brought him out of his memories and threw him off. "Begging doesn't become you, _Professor_. It's petty and weak, like your little friends. If it's what it takes to get you out of my chambers, then here. Take your sample."

Suddenly, the buttons at his wrist were undone, and his pale forearm was extended to her, faded Dark Mark clearly visible.

She bit the inside of her cheek and lightly held his arm. When her fingers touched him, both sets of eyes glanced to the other before flicking back down to where their skin made contact. Hermione raised her wand, careful to point it across his arm and not right at him, and whispered her spell. A dancing thin swirl of red came forth, undulating silently as it followed a path into the vial. A second later, and she was finished.

"Thank you," Hermione said, her soft brown eyes meeting coal black. "For everything."

Before he could retort, and she knew he would, she slipped out of his door and into her lab.

She stood flat against her shut door, heart beating wildly. She felt like she had startled a Hippogryph or teased the Giant Squid. This was crazy; he was just her colleague, dodgy old Professor Snape. Severus to her now—was she Hermione to him in his mind? She wondered.

Shaking her head clear, she began sorting out her samples. It was still early in the evening, only about eight o'clock, giving her a few hours to work before bed.

Hermione had made a master list, with the blood status of each individual next to their name, and had left room in case she needed to make corrections or notations. She already had devised a method of DNA examination that allowed her to tell if someone was 100% wizard, 100% Muggle, or a combination thereof. Everyone was as she had expected, though she took longer than necessary on Professor Flitwick. It wasn't often one was able to study the DNA from someone with Goblin blood. She made an asterisk next to his name to remind herself to come back to his later when she had free time. Hagrid would also be interesting.

Harry, McGonagall, Sprout, Snape…

Hermione's eyes squinted. Leaning back from her scope—was it midnight already?—she rubbed her eyes before looking again, expecting to see the comingling of wizard and Muggle gene sequences, indicating his half-blood status. She knew his father had been a Muggle. Everyone did.

But his genes were only pure.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: **Thanks for the loads of story follows and favorites! Now review! :)

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**Chapter Four**

Hermione knew that the best place to start was at the beginning. As much as she wanted to race ahead and figure out the mystery of Snape, she knew that she would kick herself in the end for creating all the extra work. Her alphabetized graph would look completely off kilter, and who knew where he stood in a family tree. No, she would first establish that which she knew to be true. Then she would work on the anomalies.

Even if it killed her.

She spent the first few days verifying the Weasleys, for the simple fact that she believed she had all the samples, making them easy to graph. Molly (Prewitt) Weasley, Arthur Weasley, seven children, and spouses. Done. All pure. Easy.

Harry's was also easy: Harry Potter. She didn't really know what to consider his status. His parents were both wizards, but his mum was Muggleborn. Genetically, the repetitions in his gene structure were high enough to give him magic. There was no pure or not pure. Merely magically and not magically. She theorized that a high amount of repetitions gave stronger magic, but that was just a theory. Socially, that was different. How far did a lineage have to go back to be considered pure? She doubted anyone would really be, once her findings were known. For now, Harry Potter was the mulatto of the wizarding world. She put a question mark near his name and moved on.

Fully engrossed in her work, she was in her lab from dawn until dusk, leaving for sustenance, classes, and occasionally sleep. Her students were told where to find her if they needed her, and anyone who stopped by was treated to a lecture and demonstration in genetics.

Meals were particularly difficult, given the current seating arrangements. Hermione cast a subtle—she hoped—look at Snape. Did he know he was a pure-blood? Was his father just a front for a frowned-upon dalliance? Hermione gave a Snape-like scowl at her morning porridge. If he knew, that would certainly explain his acceptance into Voldemort's inner circle. But then, old Voldy hadn't been pure either. And Snape could have only found out after Hogwarts, because otherwise he wouldn't be the Half-Blood Prince, now would he?

She was going to bite straight through her lip if she didn't stop thinking about him and focus on the task at hand. However, her guilt kept bringing her right back to him. This felt like just another thing being held over him. Another secret, another mystery. She knew how much he hated being kept in the dark, almost as much as Sirius had. And Sirius had hated it so much that it killed him.

But Hermione knew she was counting her dragons before they hatched. She had run one test. Mistakes could be made. She would have to retry it at a later date.

Hermione puttered around the lab. She knew she was in the wrong frame of mind to continue conducting important genetic tests and experiments. Instead, she put the kettle on and pulled up her partially completed charts. By the time this was finished, she was pretty sure they would all connect together in a giant spider web, ringing the room with its pulsing glow. As it was right now, the Weasleys showed up in orange, connected to the Blacks and the Prewitts. Tonks connected to the Blacks also, which in turn connected to the Malfoys and Lestranges and, a few generations back, the Longbottoms. Hermione watched them all slowly spin around the room like Fred and George's farewell fireworks, orange and green and blue.

It all mulled over in her mind—genomes and oocytes and pedigrees. She felt like it shouldn't matter, but she knew she was wrong. She only had to think about Draco's unborn child to know that, even if it was doomed to have a git for a father.

"Aren't we a little old for Lite Brite, Miss Granger?"

Of course. The last person she really wanted to see right now. "I believe you reminded me that it's Professor Granger," Hermione shot back as she hastily Vanished her graphs before he spotted "Severus Snape—Pure?" floating off to one side. "And I don't believe you are interested in my research methods." She didn't even know why he was down there, really. It was evident how much he disliked her. Whole days could pass with them sitting next to each other and not one word would be spoken outside of her occasional "Good morning."

"The glare from your light show is enough to distract anyone from their work. How am I possibly supposed to grade with my office lit up pink?"

"You could shut the door."

"And miss your attempts at expletives? Never."

"Well, then it looks like you have two options, after you wipe the smirk off your face. Pink and hear me, or close yourself back into your cave. Option two rids you of both irritants, so it seems that would be a better option. In fact, you can just close the door behind you right now."

"You wound me," Snape said in a flat tone. "Surely there is a reason you are so focused. It's unlike you to be i_this/i_ antisocial."

"No, Snape. I spend so much time down here because I enjoy the company. Of course there is a reason I'm working so hard, and trust me, you standing in that doorframe is the very last thing I need at the moment, so if you please," Hermione snapped and pointed to the door.

Snape raised a brow and held up his hands in mock surrender. "As you were," he told her and shut the door with a whispered click.

Well, that could have gone better. Hermione immediately felt guilty. There was no reason to take her own stress and lack of sleep out on him. For once, she was being unfair, and she knew it. She had lied when she said the last thing she needed was him in the door. Truly, the last thing she needed was to feel more guilt when it came to him, so she made her way down the hall to apologize.

With her door open, she realized the light from her graph really did bounce around the corner and into his office with the help of the shiny knight in the corner.

She knocked on the door, opening it even as she heard him say, "Enter."

"Following me sends a bit of a mixed signal, Professor Granger."

She nodded, sheepishly. "I'm sorry. It hasn't been since Voldemort that I've been completely sucked into a project. I forget that lack of sleep doesn't make for a pleasant Hermione. I brought you a token of my apology."

"Oh?"

Hermione ignored his flinch as she raised her wand and sent a spell into the corner. Suddenly, bright pink letters spelling out "Hermione" sat glowing in the corner.

"And just what am I supposed to do with this?" he asked as she was shutting the door.

"You'll find something."

She had barely reached the suit of armor before he evidently tried to remove the fireworks. Just like the Weasleys', these too were enchanted. Soon, echoes of her yelling "Piss!" and "Fudge!" and "Fiddlesticks!" mingled with a sound she had never heard: Snape's genuine laughter. Full and boisterous, she felt it shift something in her as she smiled and shut the door to her lab.

~~HGSS~~

It wasn't long before an outline of wizarding breeding—and inbreeding—was starting to form. A few people stood on the sidelines, and she didn't have samples of every wizard in their society, but the threads were dutifully weaving together.

Hermione resolved to test Snape again. Even though days had passed, she knew he still hadn't removed her fireworks. He was apparently using it as had been intended—for stress relief—and her voice could be heard cursing down the hall every so often, but he hadn't come back to her lab or office. Just as well, really, she told herself. It was awfully awkward.

_What do you say to the man whose life you saved?_ she mused idly while spinning the vial of his blood. What do you say to someone you've seen so close to the edge of death that they can't recognize someone whose face they've seen every day for the last six or seven years? How do you step back from that level of intimacy, especially coupled with the fact that they hate you? It was bloody well awkward.

_Who are you, Severus T. Snape? Was your dad a wizard? Was your mum unfaithful? Hell, were you adopted?_

And if any of those were true, how was she supposed to tell him?

Hermione sighed. She had done worse things.

~~HGSS~~

Night had fallen by the time they escaped the Shack, with nothing on their minds but defeating Voldemort. It wasn't until they were counting the dead that Hermione remembered Snape. Harry and Ron never did.

She watched his still and lifeless form as Poppy brought him through the back ways of the castle. It was too dangerous to bring him through the main hall, and the matron wasn't sure she was following protocol by bringing him to the hospital wing, but she knew she was doing the right thing.

Even now, Hermione could picture his face like she was seeing a photograph. White, sunken and sallow cheeks. Dirty, tousled black hair, with a few leaves strewn in and a smear of blood over one eye. Blood made its own path down from his neck, a little pool that then streamed down a crack in the floorboard. Dead eyes, chocolate brown, not black like she had always thought, but close. Eyes that asked her, "Am I going to die?" and pleaded not to be left alone.

She had done what needed to be done to win. There were going to be sacrifices, she told herself. And sometimes there was no right answer. Sometimes you had to set pity aside and go kill a megalomaniac.

But sometimes she couldn't stop thinking about what it must be like to sacrifice yourself for a cause you believe in when no one believes in you.

She twirled the vial in her hand, warming it in her palm. _Who are you really, Severus? It's time to find out._

Hermione paid even more careful attention as she ran his blood. Brand new pipette, new vial. She double checked everything before running it through the machine. She sipped a cup of tea—far away from the machine—as she waited for the telltale beep. Jumping up, she grabbed the results to compare them with what she had so far.

The people she suspected the most were immediately cast aside. He wasn't a Malfoy or a Weasley, thank Merlin. Not a Longbottom—another bullet dodged. A partial match to Black—no surprise. She didn't think any family got around as much as theirs did.

Prewitt? No.

Lestrange? No.

Bones? No.

And then she saw it, clear as day. A perfect match for his father.

The Potter family.

"_Fuck_."


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: **Well, that certainly got you all chatting. I'd love to hear it continue.

Today's shout out is brought to you by the sshg-promptfest DOT livejournal DOT com. You have TWO days to post your prompts and join the fun!4

**Chapter Five**

She rolled a quill on the table underneath her palm. Slowly it rolled, back and forth, as she looked around the staff room. Hermione knew she was terribly obvious, but if she tried to sneak, she would only call more attention to herself. Lip stuck between her teeth, her eyes darted around the room.

She watched the teachers from her small chair near the fire. In storybook fashion, Harry was sitting at the opposite end of the table, laughing in a stream of light from a nearby window. Snape scowled from the shadow just a few chairs away, obviously dismayed by Harry's jovial behavior. Hermione's stomach clenched as she watched the two of them.

She couldn't believe she had been so stupid. Even if she still considered Snape a half-blood, his mum could very well have been connected to the Potter line. No one ever told Harry he looked like Lily, did they? Except for the eyes, of course. Other than that, what did he have? Pale white skin? Check. Messy black hair he couldn't do a thing with? Check. A bit gangly? Check. A bit of bravado, an excellent flyer, and a hero complex? Check, check, check.

And just who did that sound like? She looked over at the man in the corner, who now pointed his glare at her, causing her to quickly duck away.

Professor McGonagall was talking about the holiday break, setting schedules and seeing who would still be at the castle. She would stay, of course, along with Snape, while Harry went to Grimmauld Place, where Ron and Ginny were staying. She didn't think it would be long before Ginny joined him at Hogwarts.

Hermione went through the motions of the meeting automatically, still mulling over Harry and Snape. Who would be angrier? She remembered Harry's infamous fifth year meltdowns and Snape breaking a teapot in the staff room after finding out he'd be joining the staff.

Maybe she would just never tell them.

No, she knew that wasn't an option. She was cursed with her mother's Catholic guilt. It was just a matter of when.

The meeting broke up, and Harry stayed behind with her. They had a habit of catching up and discussing the meeting afterward, enjoying the peace and quiet that always came afterward. None of the other professors wanted to linger a moment longer than needed and thankfully, that included Professor Snape, even though he gave them a suspicious glance before departing.

Hermione stared preoccupied at his departing back while Harry put the kettle on. "Harry," she asked suddenly, "do you ever wish you had more family?"

"More than the Weasleys, you mean? Or more family like the Durselys?"

"No one wants family like the Dursleys, Harry."

"Hear, hear," he agreed as he poured the hot water into a mug, then cleaned the steam from his glasses. "Are you missing your family?"

"Well, you know it can be lonely in the castle," said Hermione, following his unwitting lead. "And sometimes I have these dreams that really I come from a wizarding family and that I grew up with all of this. That I fit in somehow. What about you?"

"My biggest fantasy was being adopted. I didn't know about magic, of course, but I always imagined I had a rich uncle or that my real parents were searching for me. I have the Weasleys now. You and Ron and Ginny and everyone here, but sometimes..." Harry stopped talking and just watched the flickering of the flames. "I'd like to see where I came from. To have that bond with someone. It's hard to explain. But being an orphan, it sucks, basically."

Hermione smiled gently at her friend. She knew he was very domestic at his heart. He wasn't cut out to be an Auror or a famous Quidditch player. He was Harry. Just Harry.

"But what if it was someone like the Dursleys? Or Umbridge?"

"Couldn't be as bad as Voldemort, could it? And I think I'm already related to him."

That was a good point, she decided, and a good attitude. Maybe this wouldn't be as bad as she was expecting. Of course, she hadn't told Severus yet.

Harry had begun to drink his tea again as he warmed up to the topic. "I'd love to find someone who knew my parents. Everyone who did is dead. Well, except Snape, but I'm not about to ask him. I don't have any grandparents or aunts or cousins outside of Aunt Petunia and nothing she said is likely to be true. I don't think she really got on with her parents either. And even if they didn't really know my parents, they would still be my family. MY family. And just that makes them a part of my history. My heritage. Just someone to send a Christmas card to or something. Someone to have a tie to. Maybe even someone who doesn't hate me for being a wizard."

Hermione cringed when he turned away. How about someone who just hates you, full stop?

"Well, I don't hate you for being a wizard. Just a dunderhead."

Harry gave her a rueful smile. "Thanks. I think," he said as he ducked away from Hermione, who was tousling his hair.

"You know I love you, or I never would have put up with you."

"Back at you," Harry told her with his boyish grin that immediately made him look like the fresh-faced eleven-year-old she remembered. She grinned back and went off to find her mentor.

Headmistress McGonagall was a woman with set habits. She always took her tea the same, with two ginger newts, unless it was before lunch. Bed was at 10:30pm sharp, and after staff meetings, she could be found in her office, nursing a scotch on the rocks and reviewing paperwork with the Wizarding Wireless on.

She heard a light knock over the soft sounds of the music. "Come in," she said and watched as her favorite protégé entered the room. "What can I do for you tonight, Hermione? Surely you don't need notes on the meeting."

Hermione shook her head. "Oh no, nothing like that." She took a solidifying breath. "I have something I need to talk to you about."

"Whatever they are offering, I'll increase it by 30 percent."

"What?"

"Alright, not a job offer then. You need a larger suite for a beau?"

Hermione laughed. "Definitely not."

"Well, pish. What is it then, Hermione?" the older lady asked as she offered a biscuit, which Hermione accepted.

She fiddled with the biscuit in her hands a moment while she gathered her thoughts. "I've found out some information that I'm not sure what to do with. I'd like your advice."

The headmistress appraised the young professor and thought about how she'd grown. It was this very same witch who, as a second year, decided to take her knowledge about the basilisk into her own hands and wound up a cat. Later in her academic career, she set a professor on fire, raided his stores, formed an underground society, and left school to chase down a murdering sociopath. Any information she now had must be serious indeed, or the girl was finally learning to trust others besides herself.

"And what would this information be?"

"Well, you know I've been working on a project for the Ministry."

"I do, go on," said McGonagall as she refilled the teacups.

"I've been charting the blood purity of wizards. The first thing that I needed to do was establish everyone's blood status, and then I can follow their DNA to form familial groups. Parents, siblings, and so forth. The first people I tested were ones I could easily access, namely the staff here and the volunteers from St. Mungo's. Well, I found an anomaly. Someone believed to be a half-blood is actually a pure-blood. And I'm not sure if he knows, or if I should tell him."

McGonagall rested her head against the back of the chair as she mulled over this information and breathed in the strong steam of her tea. "Is this someone you are close to?"

"No," she admitted, "but we have an acquaintance."

"And you're saying this person either doesn't have the parents he believes or that the parents themselves were mistaken in their linage?"

"Basically," Hermione told her. "And I think it's more the former than the latter."

"That's a pretty serious accusation. You're positive, I assume."

"Very. I've run the test several times."

"Anyone I know?"

Hermione stared at her mentor, silent, nibbling her bottom lip like a chipmunk.

"Hermione?"

"It's Professor Snape."

Minerva McGonagall wasn't shocked very often. After all, she had seen many, many things come to pass in these hallowed halls. But she was truly astonished to hear her colleague's name. "Severus?" she asked quietly, as she heard the portraits around her shuffle to listen in. Nosy things.

"Yes, mistress. Severus. I was quite surprised too. And, um, I know which family he belongs to."

"You do?"

"The P-Potter line."

Hermione knew she heard an epithet whispered under the distinguished woman's breath. Possibly the same one she herself had used.

"Well, that certainly makes things difficult, doesn't it?"

"Now you see why I am asking for advice."

"I certainly do," said Minerva, relaxing a fraction and leaning back in her chair. "This is far more dangerous than a simple snake or Voldemort."

Hermione cracked a small smile and agreed.

"Let me think about it, Hermione. No rash decisions." She pointedly looked at her favorite Gryffindor, who nodded in agreement. "We'll catch up in a few days and decide what should be done."

Hermione was finally beginning to understand that a problem shared was truly a problem halved and felt like she could collapse under the relief of having a compatriot. Now when Snape decided to kill them, she only had to outrun Minerva.

The young woman left the office as Minerva did something no one else ever got to see. She kicked her feet up onto the desk, ankles crossed, and leaned back in her chair. Undignified, but oh so comfortable. She knew Albus had sometimes sat like this for hours when he was plotting strategy.

Severus Snape, related to Harry Potter. The world was really coming to an end.

Minerva heard a familiar cough behind her.

"I don't want to hear about it right now, Albus. I have some things to decide."

"So I heard. And actually..."

~~HGSS~~

Hermione was all the way down the steps and the gargoyle statue had just clicked closed when she heard the headmistress's sudden sharp brogue.

"You WHAT?"


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Here you are ladies! Thanks for all the reviews! This certainly seems to be stirring you up a bit! Next post Sunday, going on a date tomorrow. (With my husband, lol) And any massacring of the science is my fault, just roll with it, okay?**

**Chapter Six**

Severus walked the silent halls that marked Hogwarts on holiday. His foot falls echoed in the corridor, down, around, and almost to the Black Lake, it seemed. There was much on his mind and yet little at the same time. Classes were going relatively well. The Christmas holiday had left him some room to breathe and work uninterrupted, or even just to read a book by the fireside. He was currently taking a stroll through the less populated areas of the castle, where he always went when he had something on his mind. Typically, he was forced to keep to where the students often lurked and it was a pleasure in itself to see long forgotten paintings and discover rooms not seen in ages.

Times were quiet now compared to most of his life. There was little to complain about, sadly, as his masters had cruelly left him to this place to live out his life in solitude. He used to regard isolation as a thing he valued above all others, but now he was beginning to rethink that concept. Perhaps no man was truly an island. Perhaps a bridge or two here and there weren't as abhorrent as they seemed. Unless of course, there was nowhere to anchor the bridge, thus bringing his thoughts around to what was on his mind. He knew he'd arrive there eventually.

There was one person lately with whom the bridge building had tentatively begun. A strut here, a beam there. Nothing much, but enough for the locals to notice, if Minerva was any indication. Lately, however, progress had come to a complete halt. In fact, it might even be crumbling, but he wasn't really an architect.

He had thought he was coming to an understanding with Professor Granger. Oh, who was he trying to fool? With _Hermione,_ her name literally shown in glowing letters for all the world to see. He assumed taking down her charm would be relatively simple, but he hadn't really tried. It was a bit maudlin, but he liked the glow it gave his office, brightening the corners that the candles never seemed to reach.

He was digressing, in more ways than one, it seemed, as he turned down a hall that would lead him back to the path he had intended to travel.

Something had seemed to shift between him and his colleague, a strange feeling similar to indigestion that he hadn't felt before but had grown accustomed to. He had come to enjoy the time spent in her company. It was a bit iTaming of the Shrew/i to be sure, more often than not ending with her slamming her door, but in the past few weeks, those times had altogether ceased. She never stopped by his office with a question, and his attempts to engage her in conversation were met with a polite dismissal. He wondered if he had done something worse than usual to offend her. Thinking back to the last staff meeting before break, he could think of nothing offhand. She had spent most of the time watching Potter or glancing at him, and then she had stayed behind with the boy.

Snape's brows came down in their signature furrow. If the Potter boy had turned Hermione against him at long last, there would be consequences. It seemed unlikely, as he and Potter rarely spoke, thus giving them little reason to argue, and the Chosen One had been vocal in his support of Severus after the Fall. But still, one never knew, and the timing was suspicious.

He would just have to try to redeem himself back into her good graces.

Ha bloody ha.

~~HGSS~~

Hermione left her meeting with Minerva in a bit of a rush. The holiday break was proving to be a perfect time to finish her project with the Ministry so that she could focus on the issue of pure-blood children, but there were just so many blasted wizards! She felt as though she would never get through the endless piles of paperwork and test results and charting.

She came briskly around the corner to her office, face in parchment, before she was abruptly halted by almost careening into the body in front of her. She looked up to notice Severus standing with his back to her, admiring a painting high up on the castle wall.

"Oh, excuse me, um...Severus. I didn't see you there."

"Yes, I would hope your knocking me over would not be intentional and would be merely due to your own negligence."

She frowned at his backside, as he hadn't even bothered to turn around.

"What are you doing down here anyway?"

"Must I have your permission to admire 16th-century art?"

The painting in question was high on the wall, and truthfully she had never noticed it before. "It's a bowl of fruit."

"It's a masterful bowl of fruit."

"Whatever, Snape," she sighed. "I have work to do."

She was almost to her door when she barely caught, "Back to Snape now, are we?" And she felt that twinge that told her something was weighing on her conscience. She knew she had been distant, brushing him off in an attempt to put off the inevitable. He couldn't be ignored forever, and she was feeling the loss of him around, annoying as he could be.

"Severus?"

Turned as he was, she couldn't see the expression on his face. "Yes, Hermione?"

"I heard you were a bit of an overachiever in your student days, and I could really use another keen mind to help me go through some of my data. Care to learn some genetics? My kettle is on, and I have some of the spiced chai you like to pretend you don't prefer."

"Fresh cream?"

"Of course."

His eyes narrowed. "I get the first cup."

"Naturally," she answered with a smile and left the door open behind her.

She had the cups steeping by the time he strode through the doorway and casually stopped to take stock of her organized chaos. It had been a while since he had been down here, and her chalkboards and paper stacks had multiplied like the Tribbles Harry taught about in his class.

Hermione handed the steaming cup to him, and he savored it as she explained what she expected of him. There was a completed stack of tests here, the new lab results there, and the ones in progress over there. She would be handling all the tests themselves, she didn't want to lose that much time trying to train him how to handle Muggle technology.

"So, all this research is aiming at finding the cause of the infant fatalities?

Hermione nodded. "First, though, the Ministry is having me verify everyone's blood status. I had a feeling that it was purity related, as it appears only pure-bloods have had the issue. So we need to determine who is at risk, and with the wizarding world being as is it, there is a strong possibility some may not be as pure as they think they are. "

Snape snorted. "No doubt. There are certainly quite a few wizards and witches who kept a bit on the side, I assure you."

Hermione chewed on her lip and turned away, her heart in her throat, as she resisted the urge to blurt out that he was probably one of their progeny.

"It would be terrible to find out that the people you thought were your family actually weren't," Hermione told him.

He snorted again. "For some, perhaps. For others, not as much."

She watched him out of the corner of her eye as she straightened a stack of papers on a nearby table. "And you'd be one of those?"

"You mean Potter hasn't told you the sordid details of my history?"

"No," Hermione told him. "He never really told us anything about his Occlumency lessons, or the pensieve. Just that in one, he saw something he shouldn't have, and in the other, that you cared about his mum—which we ALL found out, courtesy of the Daily Prophet—and that he was a Horcrux. It doesn't seem as though things were perfect, but I've avoided reading Rita Skeeter's book."

"My father was a Muggle and a drunk. My mother was a witch and a coward. I was a wizard and, thus, a punching bag. Though I wonder if that was more the excuse than the cause."

She bit her lip harder, holding in the platitudes she knew he didn't want to hear. "My dad ran over my dog once," she offered, trying to lighten the mood.

"My father shot the stray dog I had adopted in front of me, telling me that he couldn't afford to feed me, let alone some mongrel. He didn't even care that the beast fed itself."

Unconsciously, she moved over to where he was standing, concern written all over her face, bleeding heart pinned to her robe sleeve. "Are they still living?"

"No. Murder-suicide in my sixth year. It's never been clear which was the murder and which was the suicide, however. Just that they were both gone by the time authorities were notified. They tried to pull me out of school, but they could never find it. The one thing I was thankful for. I didn't attend the funeral. I don't think anyone did."

His voice was dead as he told her the facts of his life, as though he were reading from a newspaper, telling the story of a stranger.

"What would you do if you found out you had a different family?" she asked quietly. "Perhaps some who were still living?"

He shrugged. "It's hard to have a different family when you've never really had one to begin with. It would be uncomfortable. I'd pity anyone who carries the same genes as I do."

She gave him a small smile. "Surely they can't be that bad."

He scoffed. "I have come to terms with the hand I've been dealt."

"Height, above average intelligence, a powerful presence, a coveted job, delicate hands, a commanding voice, it must be very tough being you," she offered.

He ignored her and sorted through her papers, the ones containing his information having been hidden away in her desk drawer.

"A different family," he muttered. "What most children only dream about. Some surprises will be coming."

"Only the individual whose status is not correct will know. I won't be telling their birth family or their...home family. But I think they have a right to know."

Severus nodded, and they got to work, Hermione's guilt now worse than ever.


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: Thank you, ladies, I had a wonderful night out with the husband and we just returned from taking the toddler to the circus! Hope this is worth the wait...**

**BTW: Some of you have PMs disabled, so if you don't get a reply to your review, you are either logged in as a guest or you need to check your settings. :)**

**Chapter Seven**

Hermione wanted nothing more than to sit through the entire staff meeting with her head on the table. In an effort to gather her thoughts, she had worked until almost two in the morning for a week straight. She had barely remembered Christmas or the New Year, and now it was already time for the students to return. One more evening of solitude before classes resumed. But with her diligent habits, and Snape's assistance, almost everything had been cataloged. They found two more discrepancies, but the individuals were unknown to Hermione. Several pure-bloods were also not as pure as they believed. They still edged out over the 77% threshold that made them a candidate for the genetic anomaly, but there was more Muggle than they'd care to admit. She planned on sending out an owl to all participants to inform them of their blood status. Not that most would care, or admit it.

Fatigue was getting to her, and she made herself a stronger cup of tea than normal, sniffing the fragrant fumes. There were probably dark circles under her eyes, but she didn't care. The staff would probably think it was just from too much revelry, or, for the ones who knew her well, from staying up too late to fit in one more test, one more match, one more book chapter.

Working with Severus this last week had been, well, nothing short of amazing. The very first time she could just prattle and someone _got it_. Not just it but _her_. He understood her drive and her need to learn and explore everything, and their synchronicity was perfect. They danced the dance that only true scholars and researchers could. He would start the kettle just when she was thinking about a cup, and she would dim the candles and call it a night when they both began to flag. They pushed each other harder, and his need for knowledge challenged her own. With his background in both wizard and Muggle societies, she was able to catch him up on her research quickly, lecturing him during the day and giving him reading material every night. It was always returned read. He called her a slave driver in one breath and asked for the next journal with the other.

It was wonderful.

Her brown eyes sought him over her cup, sitting in his chair—no one ever sat in his chair; she ought to ask him about that sometime—one long, black-clad leg resting over the other, head almost hidden in the shadows, like a cartoon villain. Hermione smiled a lopsided smile. The image suited him, and she was sure he knew it.

Over the course of the week, and before that if she was being honest, she had noticed that there was more to him than just his intellect.

His bum, for one thing, had almost made her bobble the results of at least three labs. It was just…tight and a smooth handful and…

Hermione realized she was burning a hole in his knee with her eyes just as her untouched cup was burning her palms. She set it down as nonchalantly as she could and pretended that she was just thinking hard on whatever it was Minerva was discussing.

"Hermione, dear?"

Her head snapped up. "Yes, Headmistress?"

"So you don't mind then?"

"Mind?"

"Coming up to my office for a moment?"

Hermione looked around her and noticed Snape was already gone. The rest of the staff was packing up, and Harry was looking at her strangely.

"No, of course not. I'll follow you right up."

Hermione shrugged at her friend and stashed her notebook in her bag before following her boss up the long flight of stairs to her office.

Once settled, she watched the other woman nervously, not thinking of a reason that she should be called to the carpet like a student.

Minerva was just looking back at her, a hard expression on her face as she gazed over her steepled hands before she let out a bone weary sigh. "We have some important matters to discuss, Hermione, about our dear Severus, which I have only recently become privy to." The woman shot a glare at a portrait on the wall.

"You know, don't you? Why Severus isn't a half-blood."

Minerva nodded. "It's not going to be a fun tale, but I fear it's one that must be told. Severus needs to know his own story. I just need to figure out where to begin." She rubbed her hand against her brow.

"Tobias Snape is not Professor Snape's biological father, as well you know. His biological father is Harry's grandfather, Charles. Charles and Blanch didn't have a solid marriage. It was arranged, as many pure-blood marriages were. It didn't take long for him to follow wizarding custom and start finding himself bits on the side. One of those bits was Severus's mother, Eileen. She was young, fresh out of Hogwarts, and fancied an older man with money, as Charles certainly was. After a few months, it was discovered that both Blanch and Eileen were pregnant. Eileen was paid handsomely to disappear, so she ran into the arms of her on-again-off-again beau, Tobias, whom she had met at a rundown pub in Manchester.

Tobias believed the baby was his, and Eileen wasn't sure, but she certainly suspected it wasn't. Either way, they had a wedding with the local magistrate, and it was never spoken of again. Tobias squandered Eileen's money and resented her once it was gone, diving more deeply into the bottle. Severus, thankfully, favored his mother as much as Potter, so Tobias was none the wiser that he was raising another man's child."

"That's…that's like something off the telly," said Hermione aghast.

"And that's not the half of it, or so I've been told by Professor Dumbledore," explained Minerva, her face hardening once more. "The marriage turned worse after Severus began school. Eileen even wrote to Dumbledore, telling him the truth and asking him to watch after Severus if something should happen. They were both killed in his sixth year, as I recall. It wasn't long before Albus recognized the Potter in Severus. His hair, the temper. He and James even fought like brothers, though they scarcely knew why. When Lily died, Albus saw his best chance at protecting the boy. His greatest secret.

"You see, Severus was there that night when Harry's parent's died. And he was the one who cast protective enchantments on the house and over Harry afterward. Dumbledore told him it was because of his love and sorrow for Lily. That a heart that had truly repented would cast the strongest protection. And part of that was true.

"But part of that is what Harry has been told his whole life but never really knew. He has always been protected by his blood. His uncle's blood that was shed that night in battle and in repentance and in protection. The hand that was complicit in their murder was not only completely and utterly penitent but also blood-related to the victim and survivor. I admit it was a stroke of genius, even if I don't agree with the fact that Severus has never been informed.

"At the time, it was kept a secret from Severus for good reason. The man was already dealing with so much grief and was still in league with Voldemort. That quickly changed, of course, but his precarious position with the madman never did. Since Albus passed before Voldemort did, I guess telling him just slipped his mind."

Hermione cast her first glance behind her to see only a bit of purple sleeve still in the old man's frame. Minerva, and now Hermione, was contemplating setting it on fire.

"This is…horrible. It's tragic. I can't tell him this!"

"I'm afraid you…Mr. Potter! What are you doing up here? Is everything alright?"

Hermione spun in her chair to see Harry in the doorway, ashen and grave, eyes as wide as Dobby's.

"I came to find Hermione," he told them, his voice monotone. "It's getting late, and I was…is it true? Am I related…to Snape?"

Oh bollocks, fudge, and damnation!

"What did you hear, Harry?" asked Minerva calmly.

"That my grandfather…and Snape's mum…" Harry looked almost ill, and Minerva raised her hand for him to be silent.

"Hermione, I think it would be prudent for you to have that talk with Severus sooner rather than later. Mr. Potter, sit with me, please, and take a ginger newt."

"Yes, Headmistress," they both automatically responded, Hermione getting up and heading out the door while Harry sank into her vacant seat.

Soothing Scottish brogue followed her out as the door swung shut, and she headed off to clear her head and find Severus. Oh, she was not looking forward to the conversation, but she knew there was no time to waste. Harry wasn't someone known for keeping things to himself, especially if he was angry, and there could be an owl off to the Weasleys' by dawn. She knew Minerva would try to head him off, but Harry was in shock. She barely had time to digest it all herself. Severus needed to know before he found out from someone else. And Dumbledore had known! All this time! How could the relationship between Harry and Severus have been changed? But it was a moot point now, even if she did want to deface the deceased headmaster's portrait.

She knocked lightly on his office door and entered at his bidding.

"Yes, Hermione?"

"I, um…can we talk?"

He sat motionless across the room from her with one brow raised in question. "About what, exactly?"

_About how your entire life is basically a lie. Oh, and that woman you loved? She was actually your sister-in-law, making Harry your nephew and James your brother. No big. In fact, I'll just be going now._

"Let's go to your room."

She followed him, taking a steadying breath as he turned and led them gracefully to his small living quarters, where she sat cross-legged on his sofa.

"You know Minerva called me to her office. The reason she wanted to talk to me was because of a matter I had asked her advice about a little while ago. She, you could say, shed a bit of light on the situation, and we both agree that it's something you need to know."

"Go on," he said slowly, sitting rigid in the armchair next to her.

"Well, you know that we've found two anomalies with the blood testing. And we had a conversation about having a different family and…" Hermione bit her lip, a habit she knew she needed to break, especially since it was as much to stall for time as it was out of nervousness. "Severus, you're a pure-blood."

Nothing but the crackle of the flames was heard for some time, joined in her ears by the beating of her own heart as she waited for his answer. His face was curiously blank.

"Who?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"Who am I related to? Malfoy?" he asked, disgusted. "MacNair? _Black?_?"

"Your mum is your real mum," Hermione told him. "Your father was, um, a Potter."

"POTTER?"

Hermione shrank back into the couch as he was suddenly on his feet, more angry and enraged than she had ever seen him. He walked briskly to the sideboard beneath the window, silent as the grave as he grabbed one glass, then two, then a third, smashing them quickly against the brick wall with his bare hand. Her mouth hung open as she watched his magnificent display of temper before he seemed to remember he had an audience. He spun to face her, and before his black cloak had had a chance to settle, he was out the door with a bang leaving magic crackling in the air behind him.

"That could have gone better," she muttered as the dust settled and she _Vanished_ the glass, heading out the door after him.


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N: **Next post Weds, hoping to meet Juniperus tomorrow. :) But here, have a lime.

**Chapter Eight**

Her feet were absolutely killing her. At this point, Hermione was fairly certain Severus had left the castle, or flown up to the top of a tower to brood, because she could not find him _anywhere_.

She had started with the places she figured were obvious. He wasn't in his rooms or his lab or his classroom. Hagrid was startled out of his evening meal and told Hermione he hadn't seen anything, nor had Fang. A loop around the grounds had shown no disturbance. Nothing in the Great Hall, the Room of Requirement. She was about to pull out her hair. Of course, if Severus didn't want to be found, then that was it. He wouldn't be found. No one knew this castle like he did, especially with Dumbledore gone.

After two hours of wandering, the adrenaline had worn off, and Hermione was exhausted. She would just have to go back to her rooms and Floo Minerva that Severus did not wish to talk tonight. She would write him a lengthy Owl and have it delivered to his rooms. Whenever he returned, he could read at his leisure and then contact her with any questions. She needed to at least try and get some sleep before the students returned in the morning.

And she was still toting her damned satchel from the staff meeting.

Finally the door of her work room came into view. "_Lumos_," she muttered and then stifled a scream when she found Severus sitting in the middle of the room, one small vial of blood just tipping in his hand, back and forth, as the blood ran down the inside of the glass.

"What are you doing in here?" she hissed.

"Don't worry, _Professor_. All of your precious vials are intact."

Hermione huffed a strand of hair away from her face in annoyance. "I didn't think you were destroying my lab. Just…why are you in here of all places?"

He didn't answer and just rolled the vial. Such a simple thing, blood, yet so, so important.

She hung back and just watched him, letting him feel her presence without being too intrusive. What did it mean that he was here in her rooms? He didn't seem inclined to talk, but it couldn't be solitude he was after or she would have never found him. There was a little wistful thought in her mind that perhaps he saw her as more than just a colleague. She thought of the dour man as at least a friend, if not something more. It would be an honor to be considered at least his friend and companion too, if nothing more. Nothing had been said between them, but maybe there didn't need to be.

But if he didn't want to talk, what then? She could just go hug him like she would if it were Ron. But he was acting more like Harry—the irony was not lost on her at the moment—and so she knew she would have to use kid gloves.

Slowly she made her way to the bench beside him and swung a leg over to sit. Knees to his thigh, not quite touching, but the closest they had ever intentionally been.

He kept his eyes averted, his gaze burning into the vial in his hand instead. He didn't push her away, but he didn't encourage her either. His hair hung loose around his face, but he didn't try to use it as a shield as she knew he had done in the past.

Hermione wondered if he had ever had anyone to talk to before, someone who wasn't looking for something in return or even just had his best interests at heart. To be fair, she was normally one of those people. But hopefully he knew now he could talk to her.

"Do you know why I've never really talked to you much since coming back to teach?"

"I can hazard a guess," he told her without rancor.

She rolled her eyes, knowing he wouldn't see. "Obviously, it's because I hate you for being such a rude and foul man who tried to fail us in every class and tried to get us all killed."

"I never tried to kill you. Thought about Potter perhaps, but never you."

"And you were only trying to save us and yourself from the suspicion of Voldemort while attempting to teach a sound Potions curriculum and spy for the other side and help us any way you could. You're also not a terribly social person and were never really taught how to handle children, so you had to learn on the fly."

By now he was looking at her, his surprise evident.

"And since I know all this," she continued, "it obviously cannot be the reason I avoided you when I came back, now can it?"

"I betrayed you," he answered, finally setting the vial to rest on the table.

"_You_ betrayed _me_?" she responded, incredulous. "The night of the Fall? No one questions why you went down to your former master that night, Severus. At least no one with half a brain. I've been avoiding you because I'm the one who betrayed you, not the other way around. Do you remember much from that night? Do you remember Harry, Ron, and me?"

"I don't remember much, but I can recall bits that include you and Mister Potter."

It was her turn to look away from him as she stared up to the ceiling. "I think I remember every second of that night. From the time the attack began until I shut my eyes sometime before dawn. I think about at least a bit of it every day. Mostly, I think about you."

Finally, she fully had his attention. There was a spark between them when their eyes met that she had tried to deny in the past. It held her for a moment before she remembered what she had finally started to tell him.

"I remember you now because I didn't remember you then," she told him, her voice catching on a sudden wave of sorrow. Voicing her thoughts and fears aloud to him was so much harder than she had imagined it would be. It was reliving that night step by step and admitted all her faults as she went.

"It was terrible seeing you there," Hermione told him as she rested a hand on his arm, more for her comfort than his. "More than I could ever have imagined. I didn't hate you like some students did. But I had never had someone's life in my hands like that before, only the splinching accident with Ron. I would have given _anything_ to heal you, Severus. Anything. Just knowing the sacrifices you've made and then thinking that this was how it was going to end, it just wasn't _right_. I healed you as best as I knew how. I gave you a bezoar—three actually—and a Blood-Replenishing Potion._**"**_

Hermione heard him swear under his breath at the mention of three bezoars. Yes, she had probably risked his life, but if it hadn't worked, his life would have been a moot point anyhow. She finally broke eye contact, turning away from him like she had that night, unable to see the accusation she knew she'd find.

"Then Harry was tugging at my sleeve, and I knew we needed to see what you gave him. We couldn't sacrifice helping everyone for helping one, as much as I wanted to stay. The battle turned fierce after that, with us thinking Harry had died and then the final confrontation. I got so wrapped up in making sure that Voldemort was really gone and checking the list of victims, then celebrating the victory, that I never went. I never went back for you, Severus, and I am so, so sorry. Nothing I can ever do or say will make up for my negligence, and I need you to know it's not because I didn't care."

By then, Hermione was fiercely wiping her eyes in an attempt to hold back the flood that was threatening.

"No one has ever apologized," Severus told her, with something like wonder in his voice. "Minerva told me she was pleased I didn't die, but that's not really the same. It wasn't your job, Hermione. It wasn't up to you to be my keeper."

"But it was!" she answered with a sob. "I knew you were there, and I knew when I left you that you were still breathing, and I never checked back! No one knew!"

"Someone knew," he said calmly. "Poppy Pomfrey can find every living soul on these grounds, and someone came for me. And they reached me before my _other_ colleagues reached me, which is all that really matters. Hermione, you saved my life that night. My life was measured in single breaths, and it's only because of you that I'm still here. You have nothing to apologize for."

Hearing the words of forgiveness from the one who had seemed incapable of forgiving was more than she could have ever imagined, and she broke down completely. Trying to stifle her sobs, she leaned forward into the crook of his arm, and he half-rested it around her.

"Now, if you want to take back this business about my being a Potter, I'll accept your apology in full and I won't even make you scrub cauldrons."

She gave a wet laugh. "I'm sure Harry would gladly scrub the cauldrons to make it not true." Sitting up to look at him better, Hermione explained what had happened in the Headmistress' office.

"I never intended anyone to know honestly. I just asked for advice from Minerva, knowing that she is under full confidentiality, but Harry overheard. We knew you needed to find out in case anything got out. Minerva is talking to Harry right now. I don't think he'll say anything publicly, but…you deserve to know. You needed to know."

He deflated with a sigh and rubbed his brow. Why was it always a Potter? "Do you know what…caused this to happen?"

She nodded and promised to tell them, but they both needed a drink first. Making them both some Irish coffee, she regaled him with the story Dumbledore had shared with Minerva. Just hearing that Dumbledore had known all along caused Hermione to use her quick thinking to Transfigure a few scrap papers into purple spangled coffee mugs for Severus to dash into the unyielding stone floor. He vented some much-needed rage against the older man, showing Hermione how truly lacking her vocabulary was in some areas.

"I would have told you, Severus," she whispered to him as he finally collapsed into a nearby chair. "I would have told you."

"And I believe you," he answered simply, fingers twitching where she had grabbed his hand.

"And I don't care if you're a Potter," Hermione told him, daring to brush her fingers lightly against his cheek.

His breathing began to slow as he watched the young woman in front of him, now on her knees at his level, her considerable mental focus solely on him and his person. The care and consideration she had shown him, tonight and the night he almost died, it was too much. And to know that he was wrong, to be happy for once to be wrong, in thinking she had avoided him for the same reason as others had. Knowing she didn't think he was a traitor or a murderer or was just being an opportunist, a Slytherin. He didn't have the words to tell her what that meant.

But there were other ways, ways not often considered in his mind, and his lips touched hers before his brain registered that that was an option.

He pulled away at her sharp inhalation, but she quickly grabbed two fistfuls of his robe and held him to her, clinging to him like he was the air she never knew she needed to breathe. His lips touched hers again, slowly, and Hermione felt his hand slip up into her hair, his long and gentle fingers curling against her skin, entwining in her hair. Never in all her years had she ever been so turned on by a simple kiss, but she knew now was not the time.

"Severus," she whispered in between kisses, "the door is still open."

She jumped when it slammed with his signature flick of his wand. Maybe now wasn't the time for some things, but it was certainly time for others, she thought, as she returned his kisses with relish.

They finally separated, her hands still grasping his robe. "And that was?" she asked.

"I have no idea," he answered truthfully, hair mussed and cheeks flushed.

"Well, should it ever be in danger of repeating, you know where to find me," came her cheeky reply as she began to disentangle herself from him. "Are you alright?"

"As well as I can be, given the circumstances. I haven't had a night this taxing in…quite some time."

She agreed. "You should probably get your rest. Me too. And Severus?" she asked as he made his way to the door. "This wasn't a pity thing, for me. I just wanted you to know. It may not have happened under the best of circumstances, but I'm glad it happened."

"Me too," was all he said before the door shut behind him, leaving Hermione to contemplate all that the day had wrought.


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N:** You can thank **Abria **for this one. I wasn't going to update til tomorrow but she sent me a super nice review and I had an hour...so here. :)

**Chapter Nine**

"I'm sorry, Harry, but Severus really doesn't want to talk to you. He didn't really like you before, and this doesn't help things."

Harry frowned at his friend across her coffee table. "I know we've never been pals, Hermione, but he's the only family that can really understand me and almost the only family I've got left. And I'm the only family he's got."

"Family has never meant much to him."

"I just wantto talk to him. Pick his brain. Hell, even just watch him. Did you know he drinks his tea the same way I do? And we both…"

"…have terrible black hair and a penchant for the dramatic? Yes, I know there are similarities between you two. Just be glad his nose comes from his mother's side and that your eyes do take after your mum. If you were the spitting image of your dad, then I know there would be no way he would talk to you."

"So you think there is a chance?" said Harry eagerly, sliding to the edge of his seat. As soon as he had gotten over his shock over being related to Professor Snape, it was suddenly all he could talk about. Harry just seemed to remember that he had idol-worshipped the Half-Blood Prince, who was Snape in disguise, and that Snape was a vetted War Hero and brilliant Potioneer, someone Harry could revere. He had always been sentimental, longing for acceptance and a family of his own. Harry had found that chance with Snape—two orphans left to battle the evils of old while teaching and protecting the younger generation. Hermione had to admit it was a fantasy fulfilled for Harry. It was even in the overly dramatic fashion he preferred.

"There might be, but you have to give him some time. He didn't even have the Dursleys growing up. Not even the food on the table and a warm, safe bed at night. Severus doesn't want to rely on anyone but himself. He always gets hurt. Always. Everyone has used him for one thing or another, and he doesn't trust you either. For good reason, I might add. He's only started to put a little faith in me, and I've never hated him and have been friendly to him since I started working here. You can't blame him for not being real thrilled about the Potters or thrilled about those who call themselves his family."

"I know," said a sullen Harry. "But I wish it wasn't like that. I know I've been a git to him, but I've grown up."

"Then you need to show him that. And pestering him like a whiny first year isn't the way."

"Just talk to him for me?"

"I'll try."

~~HGSS~~

Hermione was working diligently in her lab, grading papers while waiting for the latest test had woken up in the middle of the night with an idea, and any great researcher would tell you that the best ideas come in the middle of doing something unimportant, like sleeping.

The purity chart was as completed as it could be. She had sent it off to the Ministry, telling them that the ball was in their court. It was their job to gather any missing blood samples. As they did, she would happily analyze them and send back the results, but as a teacher for a busy boarding school, she didn't have the time or resources to track down every witch or wizard in the European Union.

Not to mention that the clock was ticking to find a cure for the pure-blood infants. Hermione was losing sleep at night, wondering how many would die before a cure was found, if it was found at all. How many innocent lives would be lost, snuffed out before they even had a chance to live, because she was too busy discovering that pure-bloods really weren't and preparing to teach her class about the scientific method.

No more sleep was to be had that night, so she had made her way into her lab to enjoy the predawn peace and solitude. Well, there _was_ solitude.

"What do you need, Severus?"

A shadow by her door jerked. He obviously hadn't expected her to see him, but he forgot that she could smell as well as see. "You didn't make it to breakfast. Just wanted to make sure your charred remains weren't down here waiting to be discovered."

"Your faith in Muggle technology is refreshing," Hermione told him, finally looking up from her desk. "And you haven't been to meals in almost two weeks."

"Not true. I was at breakfast this morning."

She ignored him, knowing he wasn't looking for an answer; he just wanted to aggravate her.

"Things appear to be progressing," came his wry comment in the face of all the whirring machinery.

Hermione looked at him and beamed. "I had a glass of wine last night."

"You rebel," he answered, finding a comfortable spot in her chair near the window.

"Did you know that when a woman is pregnant, she has to watch what she drinks and even eats? She can't smoke either because there are things that can cross even into the tough and amazing barrier that is the placenta? I mean, it filters out so much, and it can still deliver oxygen and nutrients to the baby from the mom's blood without ever mixing blood types. It's fascinating really," Hermione explained rapidly, her untamed curls bouncing in a physical expression of her excitement.

"And the point is?" Severus had learned by now to just give her a gentle prod when she seemed to stall. That generally pushed her along to her thought's conclusion. If one antagonized her, she'd have to start over or would get so flustered she'd forget the point completely.

"My point is that it carries things! There is a built-in railroad straight into the fetus's bloodstream and DNA! If I can find the right mutation, I can magically piggyback the correct DNA onto another cell and have it filtered into the baby to fix the corrupted DNA!"

Hermione had been bursting to tell someone who might actually understand about her revelation.

Severus was giving her his stern look of concentration.

"That's brilliant, Hermione."

Her heart was about to burst, so she stepped up to him and gave him a light kiss, right on the mouth, their first since he had found out about his altered blood status.

He jerked back a bit, so she quickly pulled away, but he had a small smirk on his face.

"So, not for pity and not a one-time thing either?"

"Not unless you want it to be. I've been trying unsuccessfully not to think about it. When I do think about it, I'm pretty sure it should be a several-times thing, at the very least."

"For research assuredly," he said, still smirking.

"Absolutely," Hermione said, now smiling back. "I know what it's like to kiss you when I'm overjoyed, but what is it like to have you kiss me in joy? I've kissed you in your quarters, and I've kissed you in my lab, but what about in a dark corner? Or snuck in after a staff meeting? Or right in front of Minerva? Or during a bubble bath," she dared. "Just so many options. I think I'd like them all, but to properly evaluate a hypothesis, you have to thoroughly experiment."

"I've performed many experiments, but this will be a first."

"For me too," she confided. "Which brings me to another, less pleasant subject." Hermione sat down beside him with her knees almost touching his. "Sometimes, your hypothesis is wrong. If you go into an experiment with a preconceived notion, it can be tempting to alter the data to support your theory. That's why it's always best to have an outside opinion."

"And?" he asked, prodding her to continue so that she wouldn't see how tense he was.

"And Harry wants to talk to you."

"No," came the automatic reply.

Hermione sighed in frustration. Sometimes he acted just like the boys. "Listen to yourself. I didn't even say about what. You i_assumed/i_ you didn't want to hear. With the revelations that have been made, he's really been thinking about how he has treated you. I think he has some things he needs to tell you. Harry has grown up, Severus, literally right before your eyes. I know you want to see him as an eleven-year-old miniature James Potter, but that's just not who he is, and I'm not sure he ever was."

"He has always been arrogant, lazy…" started Severus, angry that his long-held beliefs were being challenged.

Hermione agreed with him, to a point. "Yes, but have you ever seen him bully someone else? And yes, I know about his fights with Draco. But Draco had Crabbe and Goyle. Harry never fought someone who didn't have a fighting chance and without reason. And even those two are on speaking terms now that neither of them are being pressured into being someone they aren't."

Severus closed his eyes and thought while Hermione gave him all the time he needed. He didn't rage against her like Harry did. She had a feeling he raged against himself. He was always his principal detractor.

"You may tell him I will speak to him," he answered with his eyes still closed, feeling her small hand rest over his own.

"You'll have your wand. Just remember _Langlock_ if he becomes a prat," she whispered.

He opened his eyes, fingering his wand with his other hand. "And don't think I won't."

~~HGSS~~

"Harry?" asked Hermione, motioning him over to her after he had dismissed his last class for the day.

Harry talked to a few students briefly before dismissing them and making his way to her. "What's up, Hermione?"

"Well, I've talked to Severus, and he has agreed to see you."

"Really?" he asked, brightening.

"Yes, really. But don't go charging down his door or anything. I really think you should give him some time to wrap his head around things. First, he had to find out he_**'s**_ related to you, and now he has to decide if he can tolerate you. You've had a lot more insight into the real Severus than he has had of the real Harry."

"You probably don't think I'll listen to you."

Hermione smiled. "Not really, no."

"And just for that, I won't talk to him for a whole week. To prove to you and to Professor Snape that I have grown up and maybe picked up some patience along the way. Or that I've finally learned to listen to my friends who are much smarter than I am."

"I knew you'd learn one of these days."

Hermione had been leading Harry down the hall to her room for an afternoon cup. The castle was slowly beginning to thaw, but it would be a while before it was anything resembling warm. Her house-elf knew her schedule and routine, however, and Hermione's room was toasty warm with a plate set out for them both when they arrived.

"Hermione? Why do you call Snape _Severus_?"

She flushed. "Well, we do work together. You know that he has been helping me with my Ministry project. And if he isn't Severus, he is Professor Snape, Harry. If you are going to learn to respect him, you might want to start with his name."

"And that certainly sounds like our Hermione," said Harry teasingly. "Always brown_**-**_nosing the teacher."

His comment made Hermione huff in indignation. "If you must know, we're friends of a sort."

"Of a sort?" her friend asked, the conversation suddenly taking a more serious turn than he had been expecting.

"The sort that is…very friendly," she told him, hedging.

His eyebrow rose in a comical and unintentional imitation of his uncle. "How friendly?"

"I'm not sure yet," she told him. "Our…very friendly…friendship…is very new. But since we've been working so closely, we're found that we get on quite well."

"Aunt Hermione," Harry whispered to himself, equally wondrous and horrified.

"Oh, shove off!"


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N: This is one of my favorite chapters. I hope you enjoy as well. Also, there are two chapters remaining after this. **

**Chapter Ten**

Severus was shocked when Harry didn't immediately turn up on his doorstep. He had gradually started going back to meals, feigning illness when someone inquired about his absence. Those who were the wiser kept mum. The boy would just glance at him from across the table, a second too long perhaps, but that was all, and nod, resuming his meal as though nothing had happened. Severus was starting to get to the point where he wished to be confronted just to get it over with.

After four or five days of waiting, coupled with the stress of the time before, he decided to take a day of sabbatical. There was someplace he hadn't been in a while that he figured he should go.

~~HGSS~~

The last bit of snow clung stubbornly to the sides of the lane, leaving white where the dark of shadows should have been. His boots crunched in the stillness as he passed underneath a tree into a more secluded area of the cemetery. The grounds were kept to a certain standard due to the honored status of two of its inhabitants, but on a breezy, not-quite spring day like today, only a few other visitors mingled in other sections of the sacred grounds.

He followed the path without thinking. He would have even without the little plaques along the walk that described significant events of the first war and snippets of history about the couple laid to rest at the end. Would he be given a new plaque in the future? "James Potter had an unknown half-brother in Severus Snape, Death Eater-turned-War Hero."

He hoped he would get a chance to tell them where to shove their sign.

The bench was empty as it usually was. Severus found that the days he stopped by to visit his former friend and her husband were days that were important to him and him alone. Not the day of their deaths or Harry's birthday. Usually the day he truly had lost her forever, when he insulted her in front of the Marauders. Or the day he told Voldemort the prophecy, the day he signed their death warrants. Those days weren't important to anyone else.

The headstone seemed to glare at him, as usual, with its large and mocking double arches, all but screaming LILY POTTER to the world. He didn't love her as he once had—the love of teenagers, unrequited, forlorn, and overly dramatic—but it still stung.

But now, for the first time, it was the other side of the stone that held his attention.

JAMES SEPTIMIUS POTTER.

Well, that was interesting.

Septimius Severus was a Roman Emperor. His first name was Lucius, but Severus tried not to think about that. It wasn't terribly surprising to find that a pure-blood philanderer had named both of his sons something ridiculous and "regal." He wondered how much his real father knew about him after he had been born.

James Potter, his _brother_. How much of his life would have changed had he been raised as privileged and spoiled as James? Would he have been Slytherin still? He probably wouldn't have joined the Death Eaters. He wouldn't be teaching at Hogwarts. He wouldn't have snogged Hermione Granger.

Everything would be different. But different wasn't always better. Only one of them was currently alive and sitting on the lightly frosted bench.

As much as he hated to admit it, he should probably consider talking to Potter Junior and making amends of some sort. If nothing else, the revelations made by Dumbledore and the experiments run by Hermione had taught him that you never know when you might need your family. And perhaps the boy had really grown up after all. He wouldn't know if he didn't give him a chance. Something he had never really given him in the first place.

"Oy, Professor," said a voice from behind him.

"Potter," he answered, aiming for civil but not sure if he achieved it.

Harry came around the other side of the bench and took a seat, tucking his robe underneath him. "I think Harry would be appropriate at this point, sir."

"Harry, then. What brings you here? Searching for me, no doubt?"

"Actually, I thought you were waiting for me. This is one of the days I always stop by."

"Today?"

Harry nodded toward his dad's side of the stone. "My dad's birthday."

"And so it is."

Severus pulled a small flask from one of his many pockets and held it aloft. "To James," he said, taking a swig and handing it to the boy…the man beside him.

"To my dad," said Harry, choking a bit on the Firewhiskey before handing back the flask and watching as the professor sprinkled a little on the grave.

"Every bloke deserves a decent drink on his birthday," he said by way of explanation. "I have it under good authority that you've grown up a bit…Harry."

Harry shrugged. "I hope so. I have it under good authority that you've mellowed out a bit too, sir."

"Severus."

Harry gave him a lopsided grin. "Severus, then."

When he looked at the younger man this way, so carefree and easy to please, he looked nothing like either of his parents. If he looked hard, he could find echoes of them both, but, like the snow, those bits were hiding in the dark corners.

"I've never liked you, Harry."

"I know that, sir. Severus. I'm fairly certain that sentiment is returned. Well, I liked you when I didn't know it was you. Saving my arse from my cursed broom, the Half-Blood Prince's textbook, and the like. I'm sorry for not trusting you. Hermione always said we should, and she's always right, you know."

"That I do know. Not that I'll ever tell her so," Severus told him with a smile in his voice.

They were both quiet for a while, listening to the melting snow. Any Muggle would assume it was father and son mourning a loss, so close was their appearance in their black cloak jackets and with their messy black hair.

"I'm sorry as well, Harry," said Severus so quietly at first that Harry had to strain to hear him. He'd never ask him to repeat himself. "I never would have left you that night with your aunt. I knew her growing up. I knew her feelings towards our kind. That was no place for a boy to grow up. Not that I would have offered a better alternative, but I would have found something."

"Do you wish you had known?"

"Yes. No. Every action has its consequences. Everything would be different, which is not necessarily a good thing. Just that knowledge could have changed the outcome of the war. We can only deal with the hand we've been dealt. As I said, I've never liked you. I never liked your father, and your mother and I parted ways under less than friendly circumstances. I was there the night she passed, but…she was gone before I could make amends."

"I'm sure she knows."

Snape huffed. "Oh, she knew. She knew long before then. She just didn't forgive. And don't interrupt. It's possible I placed some of that hatred onto you unfairly. I've been told that perhaps I didn't give you a fair chance. Personally, I don't think it would have mattered, but under the circumstances, I think it would be best if we get to know each other. Outside of house politics, personal prejudices, and past history. Merlin, Potter, we really do have a lot stacked against us." He took another sip from the flask and offered it to his companion, purely for warmth.

"There will be a few people that will help bridge the gap," said Harry. "I hear Hermione has a vested interest."

Severus twitched at the sound of Hermione's name but said nothing for a moment. "I spoke to someone else in your little family who suggested we make an attempt at reconciliation."

"Ron?"

"Mr. Weasley."

"Oh, that makes more sense. They've always liked you."

Severus made a noncommittal noise, and the two fell back into silence.

In a way, he felt that the responsibility of watching over Harry had fallen to him now. Arthur would protest, of course, but not only was Severus blood, he had been doing it since the night the boy's parents died. It was his spells keeping Harry safe, the ones he cast knowingly and unknowingly. He owed it to his…brother to keep his nephew safe.

"Would you and my dad haveever been friends?"

"Not bloody likely," Severus answered. "Relation or no, we were too different. We didn't understand each other on a very basic level. It was hatred at first sight. Perhaps that was our magic recognizing something we couldn't have known, who knows?"

"Can you and I ever be friends?"

"That is yet to be seen," he answered gravely. "But you're currently tolerable, and that's a fair bit better than you've ever been."

"Thanks, Severus. You're not too bad yourself. Maybe you can be Uncle Sev," he added cheekily.

"Don't make me kill you in front of your parents," Severus deadpanned.

Harry burst out laughing as though he had just heard the punch line to a joke. "Oh, I can see why Hermione likes you."

"Shut it, Potter."

"Yeah, that's basically what she said too. So, forgiven?" asked Harry, rising from the bench with his hand extended.

"Indeed. And the same?"

"Of course," said Harry with that same bright smile, and they shook.


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N: Next chapter is the last! Now excuse me, I'm writing a one-shot gift for Madeleone and Severus wants to take his clothes off. **

**Chapter Eleven**

"What are your plans for the summer?"

Hermione shrugged and rolled over on the couch to face Severus, who was sitting in a chair near the fire. They were in his sitting room, enjoying an unexpected free night. She supposed now they could be considered "dating" or "together," though they hadn't put a label on it. They had been together about six months and hadn't discussed the summer holidays. He certainly wasn't her "boyfriend," and they hadn't quite made it to "lover." "Significant other" would do for now. Her plus one. They hadn't talked much about what the future held. She just expected to take it day by day. But that certainly didn't mean she was completely unaware of his feelings.

He never really said anything. He had never been a very verbal man when it came to himself. His subject, his disdain for others, then he showed his eloquence. But he never talked much about his feelings for her. However, he showed them remarkably well. He was ever courteous, opening doors and seating her first, and she was greeted with a kiss whenever possible. She was admittedly surprised at how physically affectionate he was, like they were this evening.

One of his hands rested on her calf where her leg hung over the sofa. As she laid there reading, his fingers slowly kneaded the muscle until she practically purred and stretched her leg as far as she could in his direction. It was making it very hard to concentrate on what he was asking her.

"Probably visit my parents a bit, and the Weasleys, of course. Hopefully finish my experiment. You?"

"I'm not sure," he said as he reached for her other leg. "Nothing so grand, I assure you."

"Well, wherever I go, you're welcome to join me. Especially if you keep doing that."

"What? This?" he asked as his hand slid further up her leg with a wicked gleam in his eye she never recalled seeing before.

"Close, but not quite that..." said Hermione, fully rolling over onto her back now and sitting up to meet him.

His hand ran up her side until it rested just underneath her breast. "This perhaps?" he asked, leaning in.

"Closer."

She relished the feel every time their lips met. It never got old. How was it that she of all people was snogging Professor Snape? THE Professor Snape? But as he kept kissing her, deeper thought soon gave way, and she was carried off into happiness.

He must have been in a very good mood thinking about the end of the year because he let his hands drift further and further out of his comfort zone. One slid up the fabric of her blouse as the other slid under her bum.

"Oh! That reminds me!" said Hermione, ignoring the impatient growl from her partner as she reached into her back pocket. She produced a shiny little gold key on a string and handed it to him. "Here! Harry said you should have this, and he's right, of course, since it obviously belongs to you, but I don't think he was quite comfortable giving it to you."

Severus sat dazed for a moment. It was hard for a man of any age to suddenly and dramatically switch gears from amore to conversation. He took the proffered key and held it close to his face. Much of his senses had improved as a result of not being taxed by two masters. His vision, however, was not one of them, and he was still too vain to wear his reading spectacles much. Regardless of how much Hermione enthused over them.

The key was quite delicate, and Severus recognized it at once. "A Gringotts key?"

Hermione nodded. "For your vault."

Severus reached a hand into a pocket to pull out a key ring. One key was fastened by a strand of leather. It was bronze and battered, not at all like the shiny gold one in his other hand. "This is to my vault."

"That one," she told him in her bossy tone while pointing to the golden key, "is the key to your other vault. The Potter vault."

He tossed it back to her as though it burned, and she, anticipating his reaction, caught it swiftly and held it back out. "Take it," she told him. "It's yours."

"It's Potter's," he spat. "Harry's. Just because we have some family in common does not mean, under any circumstances, that I need his charity. I have never needed or wanted anything from James."

He was getting better about saying the name James Potter as though it wasn't synonymous with evil, but he currently forgot himself. This was exactly why Harry had backed out of the job and gave the key to Hermione. Perhaps not coming from his hand, it would seem less like charity, which it wasn't.

"Honestly, Severus," she continued, "Harry likes you, but he isn't about to give up half of his fortune. You know he wants to marry Ginny, and her family barely has two Galleons to rub together. You know Arthur and Molly refuse to take anything from the boys." She laid the key on the armrest of his chair and turned to sit more comfortably on the couch to explain. "Goblins are like house-elves. We don't understand their magic. Running the bank has given them certain magical knowledge. One is knowledge of families. If I had thought of it, I would have tried to enlist their help before doing the purity chart on my own. But anyway, they know instantly when a wizard sires a child. How else would they know if something happened to the father and the son didn't have the key? All the family vaults are passed down from heir to heir unless a will states otherwise. Rather progressively, in my opinion, if a patriarch dies with no will, the vault is divided evenly between the sons. Not the daughters yet, but someday, I hope. When Harry received the key to his vault containing the Potter fortune, what he didn't know—nor did Hagrid, obviously, or everyone would have known—was that it was half of the Potter fortune. This key is for your rightful half. Probably never even seen by James Potter."

He picked up the key again and turned it in his hand. Not for James. For Severus.

…For Severus.

He looked up at Hermione, who was watching him with bated breath. Possibly waiting for him to throw a fit again. She was also For Severus.

It was time something else became For Severus.

His life.

"Come with me," he half demanded, and the glint in his eye intrigued her enough that she didn't argue with his tone but stood up and followed him out the door.

First, he Apparated them both to Gringotts. He showed the goblin his key, and the goblin merely raised aquestioning but silent eyebrow and led him to the correct vault. Goblins were discrete by nature and had to be in their profession. If Severus didn't volunteer information, the goblin wouldn't ask. After inserting both keys, the door creaked open to show a vast pile of gold.

"Harry got his vault after it had been used for a while by James and Lily, and he was still overwhelmed. I can't believe how much is here! This looks like Bellatrix's!"

Snape gave her a quick glance, hoping the goblin would choose to ignore her, before attempting to take in the sheer magnitude of wealth. Piles of gold, silver, and bronze, halfway up the walls. A few trinkets here and there—gems, pearls, a teak box. He took a simple pearl necklace and strung it around Hermione's neck while she looked at him, bewildered.

"It would look terrible on me," he told her. "No sense in it sitting here."

She was fairly certain that meant "Thank you" in Severus-speak. They'd work on that.

Severus's gaze had wandered back to the glimmering riches. His personal vault wasn't sparse by any means, but he still needed to be employed.

With this, however...

"We will return," he told the goblin before taking Hermione's hand and leading her out of the bank and back to the school grounds. She protested a little this time, asking why they couldn't at least sort the vault straight—she hated to leave it a mess and untallied—or grab a bite to eat.

"I have something important I must do, and I would like you with me when I do it."

"Well, alright then,_**"**_ she supposed.

He led her straight to the Headmistress's office and opened the door with his signature 'bang!' Minerva startled, almost spat out her tea, and the portraits on the walls hastily returned to their frames to watch the spectacle.

"I hereby give my verbal resignation as the Potions master and Head of Slytherin House at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry," Severus said in his most commanding teacher voice.

"What?" asked Minerva, shocked. "What is this? You can't just resign!"

"Yes, I can. In fact, Dumbledore never saw fit to put dates on my contract. I am not locked into any tenure. I may come and go as I please, probably so that he could fire me should I have turned coat. Again. This year shall be my last."

Minerva managed to stutter out, "Why? Why are you doing this now?"

"Well," he said, grabbing Hermione's hand and pulling her close, "I have just recently discovered that there are people who care about me, and it's made me realize my existence here is pretty shitty. I hate teaching, I'm not fond of groups or crowds, I don't like living in the dark, I hate the cold, and the pay is terrible. But now I have a vault full of gold and a pretty girl."

Even Hermione's eyes were wide as he spun to Albus's portrait, who was staring at him with his mouth agape. "And fuck you, Albus. Fuck you with a Venomous Tentacula. Fuck you for treating me like a pawn. For keeping me locked in a cage with bars made of guilt and desperation and false hope. Fuck. You. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a house to prepare, books to pack, and a girl to shag. You had better start looking for a replacement."

With his hand still locked in Hermione's, he walked out of the office, dragging her behind him with a startled yelp.

As soon as the staircase reached the bottom, she wrenched her hand away. "What were you thinking?!"

"I believe I was fairly concise. Do you not approve?"

"Well, no, it's just that…well…that was rude, Severus," she finally managed, feeling like she needed to say something to reprimand him but not really coming up with a reason why. He certainly did deserve to go do whatever he wanted. He had given up enough of the life he had never really had in the first place.

He just smirked. "It was a bit, wasn't it? Now, which shall we start on this evening? Packing the books or shagging the girl?"

"Oh, you are impossible."


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter Twelve**

"Hahaha!" came the maniacal laughter from the back of the little shop in Diagon Alley. "It works!"

"Well, send it off then and be done with it. You've earned a break."

"I have, haven't I?"

Hermione came out of the back room with a paper in her hand. "I can synthesize a drug now that will reverse any genetic abnormality. It has to be taken in the first trimester, but, since pregnancy is detectable within days, there is no reason to think that that would be a problem. Especially since we know who is at risk. And it should be fairly simple now to come up with something preventative."

She came around the counter he was working at, ensured there was nothing volatile in the way, and wrapped her arms around him. Her radiant smile could have lit the whole shop. "I did it. They thought it was a lost cause, and I did it."

"Of course you did. You're a know-it-all and a swot."

"Oh, shush. Now leave me be, I need to send an owl."

Snape returned to stirring his cauldron. "I believe you violated my space, not the other way around. Did you read the _Prophet_ this morning?"

"No, I've been busy. What did I miss in that rag today?" she called from the back office.

"You're too late for Draco. Cassiopeia was born last night, a healthy baby girl."

Hermione let out a sigh. She had assumed the baby was going to be healthy since she hadn't heard, but one never knows and tests can be wrong. "Good to hear."

"But Ginerva may be requesting your services."

"What?!"

"Her engagement to Harry was announced this morning."

"Well, it's about time!"

"Indeed."

Severus wiped his hands on his shop apron and came to lean on the doorframe of the office. "And speaking of about time…"

Hermione lifted her head from the letter she was drafting to give him a questioning stare.

"I think you should stay here once school resumes."

"Oh you do, do you?"

"Yes. I do."

She went back to her letter as though what he had said was of little importance, when really her heart was racing and the blood was singing in her ears. "Well, we'll just have to see. I suppose you need someone to keep house and do your books."

"Most assuredly. And now that I have a house fixed up and books unpacked, there is only the girl to shag. I fear it's an ongoing chore."

She smiled at the parchment. "You poor thing. Is there anything else that might be required of me? I'll need full disclosure before I agree to any sort of arrangement."

"Oh, there will be socks to darn, and you'll have to commute to work. You'll have to put up with me, that's a big one, and I'm afraid Harry has made himself a semi-permanent fixture on Fridays for chess and beer. And you'll have to wear this."

Hermione's head jerked up as Severus pulled a small gold band bearing an impressive solitaire diamond out of his pocket.

"Severus!"

"Hermione," he mocked, attempting to disguise his nervousness. They hadn't really discussed marriage, but he was much more comfortable showing than telling. "So, what do you say?"

"I'm bringing Crookshanks," she told him softly, rising from her chair.

"Fine."

"And I'm going to clog the drain with my hair."

"They have spells for that."

"And I'll probably have a torrid love affair with the owner of the new potions shop and apothecary."

"Somehow, I'll survive the indignity."

"Then yes, I'd love to."

Severus stepped forward and slid the ring onto her finger as she kissed him soundly. As he deepened the kiss and started drifting a hand underneath her skirt, she whispered, "It's Friday."

"Mhmm."

"Harry comes up on Friday."

"Bugger Harry," he told her and waved his hand towards the door, which obediently shut and locked with a thud.

Merlin, she found it sexy when he did that.

His hand returned to its path up her leg, and it wasn't long before she found herself breaking in the new counter.

Sometime later, as he laid over her catching his breath, her skirt up over her knees and his trousers on the floor, she whispered to him, "I love you, Severus."

"And I love you," he answered. He still didn't say it often, but she was patient. Of course she liked to hear it, but she liked the way he showed it too. No one could call in to question Severus Snape's loyalty. If he decided he was your man, you could rest assured that it was a done deal.

Hermione gave him a fond smile and tucked a strand of sweaty hair behind his ear. "I'm glad you found love again."

"I think I may have for the first time."

She leaned up and was tasting the salt of his lips when she heard noise in the background.

"I think Harry's here."

"Uncle Severus!" they heard him call from the doorway.

"I hate when he calls me that."

"Well," she told him sympathetically, "you did keep him waiting."

Severus quickly straightened his clothes and helped hoist her off the tabletop. When all was set to rights, he unlocked the door.

~Fini~

**A/N** That's all, my lovies! I hope you enjoyed. A few people have mentioned it feels a bit rushed. Please remember it was written for the Exchange and I was on a time schedule. :) Feel free to add me to follow, I have several more stories to post. Thanks!


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